Taika Waititi Confirms ‘Thor: Ragnarok’ Will Travel to Planet Hulk

Because Thor: Ragnarok is a gift for all of us who wondered what the two M.I.A. Avengers had been up to during the events of Captain America: Civil War, it’ll be combining two very exciting comic arcs from Thor and the Hulk. Rumors of Planet Hulk have abounded for most of this year, and Marvel seemed to confirm that parts of that storyline would make it into the new Thor movie when they revealed Hulk’s gladiator armor back in July. Now, the director himself confirmed that not only would Thor: Ragnarok reference Planet Hulk, they’ll actually be going there during the movie.

In the comics, S.H.I.E.L.D. shoots Bruce Banner into space, intending to send him to a lush, uninhabited planet where his Hulk-ness won’t be a problem. Instead, he gets sucked into a wormhole and ends up on the planet Sakaar, where he makes a name for himself as a fighter in a gladiator arena. Thor later finds him, which hopefully means we might get to see these two throw down in the new movie. In an interview with Total Film (via MCU Exchange), director Taika Waititi confirms that Sakaar will be a location in Thor: Ragnarok.

Sakaar was just an insane, far-off, futuristic place which was the biggest shift for the film and these characters…I was really excited when Kevin [Feige] and the rest of Marvel jumped on board with the idea to use [Jack] Kirby as a big influence in the design of the film. What’s really hard is staying authentic.

What’s exciting about this is that Thor: Ragnarok is going to all the weird places the Avengers and Captain America movies have so far stayed away from. We got a taste of the weird when Guardians of the Galaxy came out, and it felt like a revelation, so it looks like Ragnarok is continuing this trend. And we’ll also be getting deeper into Thor’s mythology and magic with characters like Hela (Cate Blanchett), Valkyrie (Tessa Thompson), and the Grandmaster (Jeff Goldblum), which will feel entirely different from the Earth-bound politics of the other recent movies. One thing’s for sure with this Planet Hulk news: once we leave Earth, things are about to get interesting.